10.09.08

United Kingdom

There is some sad (or outrageous) news about what has happened in the UK. As scandalous as it may seem, software patents were pushed a step further into enforceability in the UK. Glyn Moody, a mathematician, explained why this is utterly ridiculous.

…[A]llowing physicists to patent the laws they discover, or the theorems that mathematicians prove. The point is, software is not “closer to a mathematical method”, it *is* a mathematical method, or rather a concatenation of them.

All this juridical “on the one hand” and “on the other” in the interests of “balance” does not change this. The current decision is seriously bad news, because it opens the door to even more weaselly patent applications that contort themselves into the magic position to gain the favour of whichever Jesuit is on duty that day.

Technology companies will find it easier to safeguard their innovations in the UK after a court ruled that software should receive wider patent protection.

The Court of Appeal said today that complex software such as programmes designed to make mobile phones and computers work faster can be patented in the UK.

Previously, manufacturers could claim commercial exclusivity for their products under copyright laws but had less legal protection for underlying technical processes.

As a result of the ruling, developers are likely to find it easier to secure approval from the UK’s Intellectual Property Office (IPO), which has traditionally been reluctant to grant patents to cover software.

Companies looking to obtain and enforce software patents in the UK received a boost today when the Court of Appeal ruled against the UK IP Office in its appeal against a decision of the High Court in the Symbian case. The High Court had overturned a UKIPO decision not to grant a patent to Symbian for an accelerator relating to iPods, mobile phones and computers.

Today’s Court of Appeal decision on the Symbian case has affirmed that the UK and European approaches to software patentability are fundamentally compatible. This upholds a High Court decision which had overturned the rejection by the UK-IPO of an application to patent “Mapping dynamic link libraries in a computing device”.

The prolonged mission to ruin more patent systems makes gradual progress. These laws are incompatible with Free software and Nokia should be ashamed of itself for doing what it does (not for the first time).

Arguments on why section 4.11 of the Patents Manual needs to be modified.

3. There are now attempts being made in India to bring in software patents using either the EPO or the USPTO practice. This attempt is being supported by a small number of large international software companies, who had earlier benefited from software being free from patents and are now trying to obstruct others who are entering the field. It is not in the interest of India’s software industry to have restrictive patent regime, particularly as they switch from being service providers to product developers.

After introductions by Sunil Abraham of CIS, the discussions were kicked off by Sudhir Krishnaswamy (an Assistant Professor at National Law School), who spoke about typology of laws; principle-based arguments for excluding software from patenting; policy-based arguments for the same; and lastly, strategies for combating the patent manual. About the rationale behind excepting software (“computer programmes per se”) from patentability, he theorised that given the location of “computer programmes per se” in section 3(k) of the Act, surrounded as it is by “mathematical or business method” and “algorithms”, the exception seems to be a principle-based one and not a policy-based one. He also talked about what he saw as the practical realities of the Patent Office, and questioned the role the Draft Manual would actually play in the decisions of Patent Examiners.

He listed out economic arguments as:

1. Inapplicability of the incentive arguments. The software industry does not need patents since copyright covers software, and even if incentives are required, that is incentive enough;
2. Return on investment. Short shelf-life, and hence 17-year patent terms are irrelevant when the shelf-life is so small;
3. New intermediaries are created, who are neither producers nor consumers of software. These intermediaries who help in price-discovery. They discover value in patents which were previously thought neglected by the process known as patent trolling.

UK-based telecom major British Telecom has filed a patent application in India for its invention computer telephony system, which could make a phone call through internet more secure, a development particularly more useful for call centres.

In August this year, the US Patents and Trademarks Office granted Microsoft ownership of “page up” and “page down”. So in theory, no other company can scroll without permission and acknowledgement to Microsoft in monetary terms.

A number of seemingly ubiquitous software ideas have been patented: the use of tabs to shift from one hyperlink to another on a web page, the “Add to Shopping Cart” function that appears on every online store, automated online loan requests, and even reducing image size to make a webpage load faster.

“Most companies register defensive patents to protect themselves, not offensive ones,” said Sunil Abraham of Centre for Internet and Society. “Not many actively pursue patent infringement, but it is still very scary for a small-time entrepreneur.”

At a time when the Indian Patent Office is in the process of putting together a new Manual of Patent Practice and Procedure, the Centre for Internet and Society is holding a one-day consultation on the issue of software patenting in the city. Participants include the Delhi Science Forum, RedHat, IT for Change, Open Space, as well as the Alternative Law Forum.

Patent Trolls

PA Advisors, LLC is an arm of Erich Spangenberg’s patent-holding empire. Its job is to assert U.S. Patent No. 6,199,067, which claims the use of user profiles in Internet search; it was used to sue Google, Yahoo, Facebook, and several other smaller players in November 2007.

Matsuura describes modern-day patent trolls as companies that primarily own a portfolio of patents but manufacture or market nothing. They exist primarily to seek out financial compensation from firms that infringe upon their patents.

The guy whom they cite, Jeff Matsuura, has an iffy name in some circles.

A global petition designed to raise awareness of software patents has been launched September 24 as part of the World Day against Software Patents. Currently in draft format, the petition includes information about how software patents can affect business, research and development.

Software Patents: A Time for Change?

Over the years, nearly all limits to patentable subject matter in the U.S. have been removed by the specialized patent court without input from Congress, empirical evidence to justify its decisions, or consideration of values and principles outside of the patent system. Problems related to software patents have sparked calls for patent reform here in the U.S. and have driven efforts to reject legislation authorizing US-style software patents in Europe.

he Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) is challenging a bogus patent on Internet music files that could stifle new innovations in online music distribution. Seer Systems was awarded this illegitimate patent for a system and method for joining different musical data types together in a file, distributing them over the Internet, and then playing that file.

Good insights from a reader are probably worth including at end this quick digest.

Here is part of an old judgment: “it would be somewhat arbitrary and unfair to discriminate against people who invent programs which improve the performance of computers against those who invent programs which improve the performance of other machines. However, as against that, what goes on inside a computer can be said to be closer to a mathematical method (which is, of course, not patentable by virtue of art 52(2)(a)) than what goes on inside other machines.”

“I don’t understand the difference between “computers” and “other machines”,” says the reader. “And people do not “invent programs,” they “write programs.”

“Freedom of expression cannot be limited by patent law but freedom of expression is not enough because the patent guys will say “fine, you can have your freedom of publication.” But there is still patent infringement when you run it into a piece of hardware: “Any problems caused in the context of patents in the field of IT, in particular in conjunction with OSS, might be solved by carefully redesigning the effects of granted patents, preserving freedom of expression when software code is exchanged over the internet as long as the computer program code isn’t matched with the desired processor for production operation.”” █

Share this post:These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages.

3 Comments

The Symbian decision isn’t a good one, but it’s probably not as bad as you describe: certainly, it seems the UK is still out of step with Europe on this.

The original UKIPO decision against Symbian was actually extemely good; and took the UK a good couple of steps forward. The appeal from Symbian is a set back, but we’re still less software patent friendly than many other countries.

Symbian basically got through on a technicality: they convinced a Judge their DLL system was more reliable. It’s plainly not, but they managed that. Other patenters are going to find it difficult to make use of the same loophole.

What Else is New

Principled, opinionated, self-governing individuals aren't any good for corporations looking to not only use their projects but to totally control those projects (copyleft licences such as GPL already make that hard enough for them, so it takes more time for legal 'hacks' such as software patents, "clown computing" and GitHub)

Certain groups that claim to represent the values of "Open Source" are in fact promoting the interests of Microsoft, GitHub etc. (i.e. monopoly or "open" as in a bunch of monopolies like Facebook and Microsoft sharing code snippets/resources over GitHub)

Torvalds and others who are middle-aged (or older) males are often torpedoed using weakly-backed allegations (or insinuations/innuendo) of sexism; that does not seem to matter and won't matter when they treat men the same (or worse)

Linus Torvalds was not fully canceled; nor was Richard Stallman, who's still heading the GNU Project (under conditions specified by those looking to oust him; people who code for Microsoft GitHub and many IBM employees)

General Hugh Shelton, Chairman of the Board of Red Hat, explains (keynote in 2011 Red Hat Summit/JBoss World) that he was introduced to the system as part of a military campaign; it basically helped war, not antiwar

Techrights examines Red Hat’s (IBM’s) hypocritical claims about the Free Software Foundation, founded by Richard Stallman back when IBM was the “big scary monopolist”; IBM employees were prominent among those pushing to oust Stallman from the GNU Project, which he founded, as well

The (in)famous letter against Richard Stallman (RMS), which was signed by many Red Hat employees with Microsoft (GitHub) accounts, doesn’t look particularly good in light of recent revelations/findings; it increasingly looks like IBM simply wants Microsoft-hosted and “permissively” licensed stuff, just like another project it announced yesterday and another that it promoted yesterday

One might not expect this from a so-called 'charity'; the Gates Foundation's critics are often met with unprecedented aggression, threats and retribution, which make one wonder if it's really a charity or a greedy cult of personalities (Bill and Melinda)

The assault on the media by Bill Gates is a subject not often explored by the media (maybe because a lot of it is already bribed by him); but we're beginning to gather new and important evidence that explains how critics are muzzled (even fired) and critical pieces spiked, never to see the light of day anywhere

Microsoft buying GitHub does not demonstrate that Microsoft loves Open Source (GitHub is not Open Source and may never be) but that it loves monopoly and coercion (what GitHub is all about and why it must be rejected)

The European Patent Office (EPO) keeps granting fake patents that cause a lot of real harm (examiners are pressured to play along and participate in this unlawful agenda); nobody is happy except those who profit from needless, frivolous lawsuits

After contributing to the cancellation of Richard Stallman (RMS) based on some falsehoods perpetuated in the media we're seeing the sort of thing one might expect from IBM (more so now that it totally controls Fedora and RHEL)